


Just a Kiss

by NephthysMoon



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-21
Updated: 2012-10-21
Packaged: 2017-11-16 18:04:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/542288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NephthysMoon/pseuds/NephthysMoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Koh thinks Katara needs to learn a very important lesson about the words she speaks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just a Kiss

**Author's Note:**

  * For [misswildfire](https://archiveofourown.org/users/misswildfire/gifts).



My father told us stories of a time when the world was at peace. A time when the lands of Earth, Fire, Air and Water lived in harmony, and the Avatar still lived among us, before Firelord Ozai planned a coup that would steal the throne from his brother, Iroh and fulfil the dream of his father and grandfather of ruling the world. The Airbenders are gone, systematically wiped out the same year that Katara was born in an effort to destroy the next Avatar, and a new one hasn’t risen. We are truly alone. Iroh’s only child was killed in the coup, and Ozai’s children, Zuko and Azula, stood to inherit everything, but something happened, and Zuko seemed to have a change of heart.

Now Prince Zuko is banished with his uncle for daring to oppose his father, Katara is training to become a Master Waterbender in our sister tribe in the North Pole, and my father and the rest of the men of our tribe are helping to fight the Fire Nation in their furious bid to take over the world. Gran-Gran says that Destiny is a funny thing, and that when Katara was born, the spirits came to her with a vision, but she’s never told me what it was. All I know is that as Katara’s birthday gets closer, Gran-Gran seems to get worse, and there’s a muttering from the old ladies about a comet that only comes every hundred years that bodes ill for us all.

Baby sister – please be safe.

 

* * *

 

Katara had always felt it signalled something portentious – that she and the Princess of the Northern Tribe shared a birthday, even if it was a year’s difference.

“It’s our birthday,” she said happily, giving Yue a hug as the other girl met her in the Spirit Oasis on that morning.

“Yes,” the other said, her voice dull. Katara looked at her friend carefully. Yue’s normally happy face was troubled.

“What’s wrong?” she asked. Yue pulled down the thick white fur that protected her neck from the harsh winter climate and Katara gasped. The betrothal necklace was beautiful, but Katara knew of no one towards whom Yue had any affectionate feelings, let alone feelings strong enough to marry.

“Surely your father wouldn’t…” Katara trailed off. Obviously, her father had.

“I’m the Chief’s daughter, and today is my sixteenth birthday. He’s had offers for the past year. Today he simply made the one he’d accepted official.” The words were dull, flat, and as unlike her usual sparkling ones as possible.

“I’m sorry,” Katara said, knowing as she did that the words were inadequate. She wondered if her father was even now entertaining offers from the men on his ships for her hand, and if he was deciding which of them she would marry when she came of age.

“It is our fate,” Yue said, her voice hard and pragmatic. “Besides, I overheard a scout tell my father this morning that a ship was spotted several days off. Perhaps the Fire Nation will try to attack and my fiancé will die in battle.”

It was the most unkind thing that Katara had ever heard come out of the other girl’s mouth and she could only gape in shock. They both giggled after a moment.

“You know I didn’t mean it. I would never wish it upon anyone, not even Hahn,” Yue added.

“Hahn!?” Katara repeated, scandalized. He was the worst of Yue’s father’s younger men. He’d leered at both girls and even pinched their bottoms from time to time. If Yue was going to be forced into marriage with him, Katara felt no compunctions in wishing him dead. “Well, I do hope they attack and he meets some horrible Fire Nation soldier that throws him right on overboard!”

The sun, which had shone so brightly a moment before, dimmed instantly, and both girls shuddered. The green grass of the Oasis darkened to brown and the roaring waterfall became a trickle.

“What’s going on?” Yue whispered.

“I don’t know,” Katara said, “but get behind me.”

There was a strange slithering noise, followed by an eerie clicking, and then silence. A voice seemed to come from no where.

“Well, well, well, if it isn’t my old friend.” It was impossible to tell if the voice was male or female, but it sent a shiver down both girls’ spines. “Making evil wishes like that, girl, isn’t good for the keeper of balance in the world, but since no one’s bothered to tell you who you are yet, I’ll go easy on you.”

“Who are you?” Katara demanded, whirling around, trying to find the voice, to no avail.

“Oh, we’ll meet again, Princess,” it said, “and I promise you, I’ll tell you all about our relationship then. But for now, I’ll keep that to myself – and for now, you’ll keep your face.” It sounded very disappointed, and she wondered what it meant.

“Unfortunately, you do need to learn your lesson somehow,” it continued. “I think it will be ageless sleep. I can do that, after all. Oh, and let’s make it interesting – someone you despise will have to break the curse – someone of the Fire Nation…a Prince. Until then, sweet dreams.”

Out of nowhere, a long stinger appeared from her left, and Katara felt a sharp pain in her side as it pierced her. She slumped and hit the ground. The sun returned, the grass turned green, and the waterfall began to roar again. Yue looked down at her friend, crumpled on the ground at her feet, and began to scream.

 

* * *

 

“So, you’re suggesting we simply surrender ourselves to the leaders of the Northern Tribe and hope for clemency?” Zuko asked his uncle, rubbing his forehead with his hand.

“It is known the world over that we have been banished and labelled as traitors to the Fire Nation. We can seek refuge and provide them with information on the comet, help them prepare for your father’s invasion.” His uncle’s voice was firm.

“There is also the matter of their scouts, Prince Zuko,” Jee added. “We know we’ve been spotted and it’s unlikely we’d be able to escape.”

Zuko prepared himself for prison. He prepared himself for execution. He’d been ready for all of these things from the day he’d defied his father and broken his uncle out of prison.

What he hadn’t been prepared for was to be welcomed, taken directly to a spiritual centre of the city by a beautiful white-haired princess who hastily explained a garbled tale about a spirit with a stinger and a sleeping girl before being told that since he was a Prince of the Fire Nation he had to kiss this girl to break her curse and then seeing, in the flesh, a vision of exotic loveliness.

Brown skin and dark hair that framed large, closed eyes that were probably the same shade as those of everyone else in the city – a startling shade of blue he was unused to. He tried to imagine what they would look like. He couldn’t do it. It seemed like half the damn city was staring at him. What was the big deal?

He leaned down and pressed his lips to hers. They were surprisingly cool, and he wondered if he’d just been tricked into kissing a corpse.

Thwap!

“What do you think you’re doing!?” a shrill voice asked him. He realized he was sitting on the grass three feet from what was decidedly NOT a dead girl, and that she’d hit him in the head with the waterwhip she now held in her hands.

“Saving your sorry skin, it appears, oh, fair maiden,” he said sarcastically.

He heard his uncle laugh uproariously and made a mental note to cut off the old man’s tea supply.

She had the grace to at least appear embarrassed when she realized the size of their audience. “Yue,” she called. The white-haired girl waved and smiled. “So, it wasn’t a dream?” The one called Yue shook her head. She looked over at him, and Zuko stood up and offered his hand. She rejected it, causing his uncle to laugh more.

“I’ll thank you not to touch me again,” she muttered under her breath. “I will end you.”

 

* * *

 

Naturally, of course, they lived happily ever after.

The end.


End file.
